Copy from stream - comparing different ways

There was a task from php: // input to copy the data to the desired file.
I decided to check for speed the possible ways to copy a file of 9 megabytes in size from php: // stdin.
There are several of them:

• Reading in blocks via fread () and writing through fwrite ()
• Record content using file_put_contents () data retrieved using file_get_contents ()
• Copying using the copy () file copy function
• Using stream_copy_to_stream (). appeared in PHP5

Results fread / fwrite:
Memory used up: 9440 bytes.
Spent time: 0.09 seconds.

Results file_get_contents / file_put_contents:
Memory used up: 940 bytes.
Time spent: 0.06 sec;

Results copy ():
Memory used up: 1008 bytes.
Time spent: 0.05 sec;

Results stream_copy_to_stream:
Memory used up: 1240 bytes.
Time spent: 0.04 sec;

What is most interesting, stream_copy_to_stream turned out to be faster than copy (). If you take a regular file, NOT a stream, then the results will most likely be in favor of copy ()

UPD: phpclub.ru/paste/index.php?show=1993 - UPD 2 test code

:Tested on a file in 240Mb. Everything but the fread / fwrite wins (about 30 seconds versus 60).
So on large files it is not recommended to use it and file_get_contents due to the fact that the corresponding memory_limit values ​​are needed in php.ini.

As a result, I did it on stream_copy_to_stream.